Sunday, February 10, 2008

Training

Yesterday I had a great run in the snow. 1 hr 51 min in the white stuff. Did a few hill repeats. Kept the HR low. Whenever my HR reach 160, I would walk until it dropped back down to 145. I had to focus to not focus. Every time I thought about training and racing, I would pick up my pace and my HR shot up. Spend the time running around, picking up snow and throwing them at trees as I passed them.

I purposely not to refuel myself during the long run. I read an article from McMillan Running university on the purpose of a long run. They suggest that there are two kinds of long run:

i) Long Steady Run - long run that is focus on teaching the body to burn fat more effectively
ii) Fast Finish Long Run - A long run with the emphasis on finish strong (aka run faster at the end)

Sat, I did the long steady run. By an hour and a half I was hungry. The last 10 min, I was feeling pretty crummy. I ended of the run in the trail by the river. Only the beauty of the scenery kept me going. Caution: I carried gel and dried cranberries with me just in case.

I run everyday for the past week. Feeling pretty good.

I have a treadmill at home and has been running on it. The set up is the same and I will use it as a way to measure my improvements (or the lack of). This will be a good way to gauge how effective is my training.

I found a blog that is very detail in training methodology. You can find it here => http://alancouzens.blogspot.com/. I sent it to Darren and his replied was...train more.

How true. There are no shortcuts in endurance sports :)

As we train, there is one question I often ask myself, how effective is my training? I am a sucker at not keeping records. Anyways, last Sun I was running on the treadmill, in order to keep the HR below 140, I had to lower the speed to 3.9 (miles/hr). Today, I was able to run at 4.4 below 140.

What does that mean? I am producing more (faster pace) with the same power (same HR). The increase in performance will not be linear. At least it is heading in the right direction.

Hope everyone had a great weekend. Gotta fuel up, do my chores and get some ZZZZsss...

11 comments:

Brent Buckner said...

I vote for unfueled long runs on the treadmill. Beats bonking 5 miles from anywhere.

Evidence that bonking during training is useful:
link

Jen in Budapest said...

In this book I'm reading "Endurance Sports Nutrition" it talks a lot about that but she doesn't mention that it's good....interesting...I surely don't know. Well, glad your snowball toss helped keep your heart rate low. You made it work for yourself. Good stuff.

ShirleyPerly said...

You know, during my first marathon, I only drank a 50/50 mix of water & Gatorade, no gels or any other food. I actually did not know people ate while running and had trained that way, which is the same way I'd always run for ~25 years. It may be one of the big reasons why my body holds up well running a lot of marathons. That and many years of slow running.

ShirleyPerly said...

I should add that I ran my first marathon in 3:32 and my PR is only a few minutes faster with gels.

Michael said...

Congratulations on getting out and enjoying the snow. What's on the cards this spring/summer?

Comm's said...

we all have a reserve of energy in us.. about 2000 calories. Bonking is a symptom of many things including rapid drops in energy levels.

Not a big fan of no water/no food on long runs. Especially at extremes like too cold or too hot. I always carry water.

brendaj said...

You're so disciplined with your HR training and carrying healthy snacks!

Unknown said...

Hard for me to keep with the HR stuff when my speed is slower than slow, but I know that the science says it helps to train in certain zones....but the mind isn't so willing to give into that...yet

CR said...

Do you have a indoor trainer? If so, which one?

It's warming up around here, so I'm hoping to get outside for a run soon!

brendaj said...

To answer your question I spent 8 years in seminary and got an MA in theology. Not sure what I'm going to do with it yet!

Aaron said...

There are all kinds of training methodologies, plans, fads, gimmicks and ideas, but one constant remains. The only way to show improvement is to train more -swim more, bike more, run more.

On the topic of eating/not eating I've found that I certainly don't need to eat much - don't carry anything gel/solid unless I'm going to hit the two-hour mark. Always have to drink though, so I always carry something - maybe it's just me.